Edinburgh Festival / Bartók, Beethoven, Haydn
"They play with concentration and commitment, with passion, panache..their sense of characterisation is remarkable…a group that knows precisely what it is doing…I found I'd been hanging on every note."
Wigmore Hall / Beethoven
“Their performance was filled with subtlety and wonder…the playing was breathtaking in its precision, dynamism and agility…a thrilling encounter.”
The Independent
Verdi, Puccini / DG CD 447 069-2
“The Hagen Quartet finds just the right approach, with well-judged tempi and carefully balanced textures…The Hagen Quartet plays with sensitivity, serving the music with distinction.”
BBC Music Magazine
Shostakovich / DG CD 445 864-2
“The control of colour and phrasing and the superb ensemble are all predictable Hagen qualities, but the way in which they characterise each work wtihout emotional exaggeration or special pleading is also a model of its kind.”
The Guardian
Schubert, Beethoven / DG CD 457 615-2
“Rarely has the Andante (of Schubert G major quartet) emerged so desolate or spectral as here, or the gossamer Scherzo been played with such quicksilver delicacy… (The Beethoven Op.95) is eloquently done, with perfectly judged balance of parts and, as throughout this disc, and uncommonly close rapport between the players.”
The Daily Telegraph
Mozart Eine Kleine Nachtmusik / DG CD 439 940-2
“Their presentation of Mozart’s most famous serenade brings it up as fresh as if a picture restorer had removed the accumulated grime of two centuries, so that if I suggest that they play it as if they had never heard it before, I mean it as a compliment.”
Gramophone
Brahms quintets / DG CD 453 420-2
“Formidable precision and great rhythmic elan.”
Gramophone